2012-04-13
Algeria begins election campaign
By Nazim Fethi for Magharebia in Algiers – 13/04/12
Election fever is spreading in Algeria ahead of the official start of the campaign season on Sunday (April 15th).
Authorities have appealed to voters to participate in the May 10th elections and have invited international observers to witness the vote, giving assurances that the poll will be free and transparent.
The ruling coalition that once held a majority in parliament and government no longer exists. The Movement for a Society of Peace (MSP) was the first to leave, even though it retains its ministerial posts in the government and its seats in parliament.
MSP leader Bouguerra Soltani has formed a "Green Alliance" with two other Islamist parties, Ennahda and El Islah, with the goal of becoming head of the ruling coalition.
Abdallah Djaballah, the founder of Ennahda and later El Islah as well as current president of the Front for Justice and Development (FJD), expressed equal confidence that he would be the next prime minister. However, the party is suffering from turbulence and resignations due to a lack of agreement over its lists of candidates.
Meanwhile, things look very bleak for the biggest party in parliament. The National Liberation Front (FLN) is experiencing an unprecedented crisis.
More than half of the members of the FLN central committee are calling for an extraordinary session to demand the immediate dismissal of the party's general secretary, Abdelaziz Belkhadem.
The crisis is due to the exclusion of officials and ministers from the party's election lists and, in particular, the candidacy of people who have never been active in the party, such as the former wife of Cheikh Youcef Qaradhaoui in Algiers and billionaires who were recently appointed to the party's executive bodies.
The leader of the FLN has said that he was "ready to stand down in the event of defeat" of his party's candidates.
Other parties are faring little better.
Discontent is gripping the National Democratic Rally (RND) led by Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia, especially in the far south of the country, where the spiritual leader of the Touaregs has called for a boycott of the election in protest against the men selected to represent the party.
The Socialist Forces Front (FFS), led by Hocine Ait-Ahmed, has decided to participate in the elections. This veteran opposition party is hoping to fare better than it did in recent polls, especially as its main rival in Kabylie, the Rally for Culture and Democracy (RCD), has decided to call for a boycott.
Finally, the Workers' Party (PT) led by Louisa Hanoune, which is already represented in parliament, is hoping to gain more seats by fielding former trade unionists who have worked in key sectors and hold great influence.
Parties have chosen prominent figures such as journalists, football club chairmen, senior executives, active trade unionists and well-known women to head up their lists, but there has been much debate about the emergence of businessmen believed to have paid for the opportunity to claim seats in parliament and thereby gain immunity against prosecution.
Such allegations have been made by several party leaders, spurring the interior ministry to launch an investigation and threaten stiff penalties for anyone found guilty of wrongdoing.
According to a survey run by El Watan published April 5th, at least 44 per cent of voters will turn out. Polls have not shown a decisive frontrunner, however, and instead show that there will likely be a "mosaic" in parliament with no one party holding a majority.
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![[Farouk Batiche/AFP] Front for Justice and Development (FJD) leader Abdallah Djaballah has expressed confidence in an Islamist election victory.](/awi/images/2012/04/13/120413Feature2photo1-271_179.jpg)
POST YOUR COMMENT 12
Muslimhor 2012-5-2
Abstention benefits only the Islamists. Who is calling for abstention? The former leaders of the former FIS, which has been dissolved since Doha. They tell the Algerians, “Boycott the elections,” but at the same time, their troops are on the warpath and they are all going to vote. The Algerian people have no lessons to learn from these individuals, who moved to Doha and elsewhere and who continue to try to harm the people. The people will never give up defending their sacred motherland. These people are Muslim and no one is more Muslim than they so as to be able to give them lessons! We are not imposters and renegades! Stay where you are. That is your place. Bow down to the decadent and corrupt monarchs.
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'Patriot'... 2012-4-25
To Abed- In the United States and in Europe, particularly in France, abstention in elections (equivalent to our legislative elections) normally and consistently exceeds 50% on up to 60% or more depending on the election and that is despite the manipulation of the figures and the method of calculating them based on the number of registered voters and not the actual voting-age population. You want to be more royalist than the king, but take care because it is a minefield and the cawing of certain European and even UN diplomats have absolutely nothing to do with democracy, but a lot to do with their desire to interfere in our interior affairs – and not because of our good looks, but because of their interests. You are rolling out the red carpet for these interests, but we are the ones who will be giving up our skins.
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'TZIRI 2012-4-21
Part 4- The National media and the schools of the republic should give a sizeable space in their programmes to the various issues related to the “res publica” and contribute to awareness and information about the functioning of democracy, the pursued objectives, the stakes and the rights and the obligations of every man and woman so that no one is harmed and so that the Algerian people live and Algeria lives!!!
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'TZIRI 2012-4-21
Part 3- … guarantees public freedoms and the rights of all citizens, who are equal before the law, as well as economic and social rights to employment, housing education, healthcare and so on. Secondly, the financing of parties should be legal, transparent, domestic and loyal. No foreign funding should be allowed for any party at any time in any form. And duly recorded violation must be penalised by the party’s deregistration and criminal prosecution against the leaders, who will be definitively banned from running any other political body in the future. If different parties do not share the same situation for financing, the democracy is led astray and flouted and perverse foreign interference becomes the master of the game, robbing the sovereign people of their prerogative. The power of money will establish its dictatorship and definitively expropriate the democracy. The worst excesses are thus to be feared. It suffices to observe the old democracies, which went from colonialism to imperialism (two sides of the same coin) without every consulting the “demos” about any serious subject inspire of the electoral masquerades called “democracy”. Thirdly, information must be free. The public services, which are financed by the taxpayers, should provide the citizens honest information that is independence from the networks controlled by the global oligarchies and are instruments of globalised hegemonic interests. The national media should give a sizeable space in their programmes to the various issues related to the “res publica”, …
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'TZIRI 2012-4-21
Part 2- … the law of cash. The basis for all institutions is: Firstly, the abolition of any discrimination in the ideologies of parties allowed to run in elections and to govern if it so turns out. The must reserve equal treatments of all the citizens they are supposed to represent. This clearly means that no party can be allowed if it has a religious, ethnic, geographic, ethnic, cultural, linguistic or gender basis. This condition is the basis for the democratic game and obeys the cardinal constitutional republican principal of the equality of citizens before the law, the institutions and the State. A number of parties allowed in have violated this cardinal constitutional republican principal, causing incommensurable harm to the functioning of democracy, which we are calling for with all of our wishes. It is time to take all of our lessons from or oh-so-rich experience! Islam is the precious good of all Algerians since all the parties are made up of Muslims, so why do a few parties make exaggeration and aspire to use the religion that belongs to everyone? This is unconstitutional! The people who aspire to govern the Algerians should banish all forms of discrimination and present an economic agenda that develops all of the country’s potential; protects its independence and its integrity; valorises it resources to the benefit of the working classes, workers, young people, women, constituents of the nation, producers of the nation’s wealth; … To be continued.
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'TZIRI 2012-4-21
Part 1- Each of us has his share in the responsibility for the function of society before the Eternal, and no one can ignore this. Everyone should have all of his rights, but everyone should assume his obligations toward the collective, without which we are nothing. We must remember that abstention only benefits the people in the extremes, who vote as a single person, and this includes their senile grandmothers, whose grandsons will take care to get power of attorney in well and due form. People who wish for a calm and peaceful society, which can prosper at our own rhythm and according to our own model and in step with our times should make their contribution via the ballot card. They can also demand their rights. They will be accepted and even supported. Let us be citizens. Let us be responsible by all going to vote. Just like in Islam, no forcing of anyone is legal! Democracy is the best means known at this time. It is the most equal and the most legitimate means, which allow for attaining his ideal of freedom, equality and brotherhood, which have been the dream of all men since the dawn of humanity, though it has not always been forumalated in ths same way. Democracy is thus the means in the service of the citizens to peacefully and loyally change their fate through politics, improve the lives of their children and make their lives more beautiful, etc. on the condition that the rules of the game are respected by everyone without dishonesty, without sordid diversions and without doublespeak. This is in order to have the power of the people, by the people and for the people become a reality, and not a have a fantasy and a fraudulent and violent confiscation of the people’s sovereignty by oligarchies that have nothing to do with ballots and who impose their law – the law of cash. The basis for all institutions is: …
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نبيلة 2012-4-18
Concerning elections, they are mere ink on paper because Algerian young people are still enduring unemployment and many social problems. As for the high cost of living, it is even worse. If we compare the pension of the pensioner with just the price of vegetables, it will be enough only for one week let alone the bill of electricity and other daily necessities of the Algerian citizen. So what is the use of elections if everything remains the same or even worsens? Why do we get high degrees and don’t get a job? For how long will the Algerian citizen endure the high cost of living? Everything has become corrupt!
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cheriet 2012-4-16
Islamic parties want to monopolize religion for themselves. You can’t give something you don’t have. Religion of Islam has been present for centuries. What are we going to learn from you and you are used to hypocrisy with all its forms. Do you want us to learn from you the art of lying and hypocrisy? Do you want us to learn from you love for fame and money? You weren’t even able to be just between you in your electoral lists, then there were resignations from lists because of order. Reconcile between yourselves before anything else!
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KADIRO 2012-4-15
Mister such and such, son of such and such, friends of such an such,daughter of such and such, all sailing through with the help of connections and vote their hands high for the potato at AD 120.
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abed 2012-4-14
The most important thing in the minds of young people is to begin immediately to reform laws that are already twisted. The first is to reform laws related to the judiciary which don’t satisfy and don’t offer justice to the simple citizen. There are many examples. In a few words, concerning parliamentary elections, things are even worse. It is as if legislators are professional robbers. First of all, there should be a reduction of the salary of the representative to 60,000 Algerian dinars. Secondly, there should be a limited allocation for those who attend sessions. Thirdly, there should be a bonus for those who suggest bills in which the citizen is the first one to benefit. Fourthly, there should be a bonus for anyone who presents concrete projects which benefit the citizen directly so that elections would have a meaning.
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انتخابات الجزائر 2012-4-14
If the majority boycotts the legislative elections, they should be cancelled, its organisers and advocates should resign and banned parties should be allowed to return because the regime has become a “microscopic” minority. The elections should be run by opening the doors of political action for all out of fear of resorting to violence. This is because the elections of 1991 were cancelled with these pretexts. The abstention of the majority means that the parliament will be a parliament of minority which controls the executive authority through the third presidential in the council of sorrow.
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loulou 2012-4-14
We are not with their elections. It is infidelity, wretchedness, robbery and killing Algerians and Algeria. It is an act of deceit as they have deceived Algerians when they robbed their independence in 1992. On that day, Algeria was killed once more, occupied by the Inkichari army, its followers and generals of the Pentagon. We don’t know what they want. As an Algerian, the trousers or other for the Algerian, he can also walk naked, his genital was removed, some of them have become hermaphrodite or female. They are no longer men, they are all women of some special kind whom aren’t considered part of them and aren’t from here. Man has humiliated himself and is being now raped in the daylight directly by public and private security officers, the military, gendarmes, intelligence, military security, internal security, tourism security, political security, street, house, neighbourhood, home, work, small pilgrimage and pilgrimage. Algeria and Algerians were killed. As for elections, they are used to voting instead of the people. They have prepared for the operation all means to kill Algerians once more. They have no shame for anything even God is used for them as a soap trademark. As for humans of the Algerian race, it is nothing for them. May God not reward who brought for them independence! Had they left it for the French, it would have been better than this or this, no one benefited from it. It is better to hosts foreigners than idles of the human race like this ruling junta on top of them Atika, her group, beloved one, prostitutes womanish men including the military, police harkis including Jinns and humans. We see it close and they see it far away. So just give them a respite.
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